Everyone should realize that accepted rules for State Property codes vary from State to state. Each county in Texas has an appraisal system that is an arm of the state government and the county itself has no affiliation with the Appraisal District. The Texas Comptroller oversees it. Only when its schools have board members appointed.

Don't take me for someone lying and especially who doesn't know what I am talking about. I've had to go to homes with or without the owner there and possibly a dangerous pet. Measure the house if even if the owner wasn't there. Appraise it, and move on to the next property. Its not a fun job and I don't recommend it. Hell I don't recommend the ad valorum tax system itself.

Everyone should realize that accepted rules for State Property codes vary from State to state. Each county in Texas has an appraisal system that is an arm of the state government and the county itself has no affiliation with the Appraisal District. The Texas Comptroller oversees it. Only when its schools have board members appointed.

Don't take me for someone lying and especially who doesn't know what I am talking about. I've had to go to homes with or without the owner there and possibly a dangerous pet. Measure the house if even if the owner wasn't there. Appraise it, and move on to the next property. Its not a fun job and I don't recommend it. Hell I don't recommend the ad valorum tax system itself.

But isn't the point of the OP that a land value tax is not the same thing as a property tax?

Texas Property Tax Code does state it is an ad valorem Land value tax. Improvements are included in the appraisal method.
Land value itself alone not including improvement varies from market value to location.

When I say you are penalized from beautification, it isn't because you make the land look pretty. I mean you discourage increasing value of your property improvements. Adding a pool, second story, additions (YES THEY ARE TAXED), and etc.

When you covert land from farm use to home use, you will suffer roll back taxes for 5 years of being charged ag use.

The problem is sociobiological.

We have a genetically derived sense of justice that includes a sense of what constitutes "property', "theft", and "sharing". Our sense of right and wrong are shaped by what we have "learned", but is limited by a rather strong template derived through millions of years of natural selection.

Most of that template evolved before land ownership (or anything like it in a modern sense) was even possible. We understand that "wealth" (including but definitely not limited to land) is "property". We also understand that owning property carries with it certain rights, privileges, and obligations. Trying to exclude products of labor from taxation will inevitably lead to a sense of injustice in almost every citizen because it flies in the face of our innate sense of "natural law".

As satisfying and convenient as it may be to propose anarchy or a government funded exclusively through a tax on land, neither is sustainable because we all KNOW* that is "unfair".

We also "know" that there are collective rights that should be respected.

No matter how much or little land Bill Gates "owns", how "productive" he was in acquiring his wealth, or what he earns in annual "income"; 99.9% of the population will believe that he should be required to pay much more in taxes than the average citizen.

* Excepting of course the possibility of the occasional mutant or one whose education has allowed near perfect uncoupling of their consciousness from what the rest of us humans would call "feelings".

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.C. S. Lewis

That is incorrect when it comes to the Texas Property Tax Code. Build a second story or additions and you will be seeing Appraisers with tape ready to measure and increase your property value. If you don't want your taxes to go up, your community will need to bring down tax rates in the whole district.

And that is exactly what Georgists oppose. Land Value Tax negates the improvements you make.

By declaring land as capital you all have accepting Marx's redefinition of land. Classical liberals made it clear they viewed land as different from capital. Capital has an original creator. Land does not. Pretty simple stuff.

Ground rents are a species of revenue which the owner, in many cases, enjoys without any care or attention of his own. Ground rents are, therefore, perhaps a species of revenue which can best bear to have a peculiar tax imposed upon them. --Adam Smith

Landlords grow richer in their sleep, without working, risking, or economizing. The increase in the value of land, arising as it does from the efforts of an entire community, should belong to the community and not to the individual who might hold title. --John Stuart Mill ...

Men did not make the earth.... It is the value of the improvement only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property.... Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds. --Tom Paine

I know a lot of libertarians like to quote AJ Nock so here's a good one:

The only reformer abroad in the world in my time who interested me in the least was Henry George, because his project did not contemplate prescription, but, on the contrary, would reduce it to almost zero. He was the only one of the lot who believed in freedom, or (as far as I could see) had any approximation to an intelligent idea of what freedom is, and of the economic prerequisites to attaining it.... One is immensely tickled to see how things are coming out nowadays with reference to his doctrine, for George was in fact the best friend the capitalist ever had. He built up the most complete and most impregnable defense of the rights of capital that was ever constructed, and if the capitalists of his day had had sense enough to dig in behind it, their successors would not now be squirming under the merciless exactions which collectivism is laying on them, and which George would have no scruples whatever about describing as sheer highwaymanry. Free Speech and Plain Language, February 1935, p. 159

The government has no more right to ownership of the land than you or I. There is a difference between a 'commons' and a 'collective'.

Incorrect. You and I do have the right to purchase and own land. This has been demonstrated by Locke, Mises, Schaffer, Rothbard, Hume, Blackstone, and numerous others.

Look at what you missed by selectively quoting Adam Smith:
"Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is, in reality, instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have property against those who have none at all." (from Wealth Of Nations)

Last edited by heavenlyboy34; 09-16-2011 at 12:48 PM.

Originally Posted by Torchbearer

what works can never be discussed online. there is only one language the government understands, and until the people start speaking it by the magazine full... things will remain the same.

My music/art page is here"government is the enemy of liberty"-RPEphesians 6:12 (KJV)For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

By declaring land as capital you all have accepting Marx's redefinition of land. Classical liberals made it clear they viewed land as different from capital. Capital has an original creator. Land does not. Pretty simple stuff.

Ground rents are a species of revenue which the owner, in many cases, enjoys without any care or attention of his own. Ground rents are, therefore, perhaps a species of revenue which can best bear to have a peculiar tax imposed upon them. --Adam Smith

Landlords grow richer in their sleep, without working, risking, or economizing. The increase in the value of land, arising as it does from the efforts of an entire community, should belong to the community and not to the individual who might hold title. --John Stuart Mill ...

Men did not make the earth.... It is the value of the improvement only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property.... Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds. --Tom Paine

Quoting 3 classical liberals doesn't represent the opinions of all of them.

Originally Posted by Torchbearer

what works can never be discussed online. there is only one language the government understands, and until the people start speaking it by the magazine full... things will remain the same.

My music/art page is here"government is the enemy of liberty"-RPEphesians 6:12 (KJV)For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

First, how do we determine the value of land after the nationalization of it? Assuming we implemented LVT immediately, we obviously have current market prices to determine the value. Then I'm assuming (unlike how it works in the market) the rental value will be a fixed percentage of the land value per year, which I'm assuming would be uniform throughout. But how do you "reassess" values after something like severe currency inflation? How do you determine the value of a plot that a speculator doesn't want anymore because the rental value siphons off all the value of the property? Are people still going to buy land even though its essentially in a state of perpetual mortgage?

This is my basic problem when understanding how this would actually work. Yeah, you can determine "relative" values like saying plot A is 3 times as valuable as plot B but how do you determine the baseline? If after nationalization the buying and selling essentially stop, what mechanism to you use to tie the rental values to something that has a market value?

Second, would there be enough value collected as rent to fund our 3.5 trillion dollar federal budget? If so how can we know this? Anyone have any idea what the 'rental' value of all land in the US is?

There's a lot of intellectual football on the thread but I'm interested in the details of how the Georgist system would operate. I understand the Georgist position of 'why' its not unjust to implement this system, but I don't understand the 'how'.

Incorrect. You and I do have the right to purchase and own land. This has been demonstrated by Locke, Mises, Schaffer, Rothbard, Hume, Blackstone, and numerous others.

You mean the John Locke who said, "God gave the world in common to all mankind.... When the 'sacredness' of property is talked of, it should be remembered that any such sacredness does not belong in the same degree to landed property."

You mean the William Blackstone who said, "The earth, and all things therein, are the general property of all man-kind, from the immediate gift of the Creator."

I do know that Rothbard and Mises opposed Georgist views. Hayek also disagreed but he did consent that urban land was 'unique' and even stated:

"If the factual assumptions on which It Is based were correct, i.e., if it were possible to distinguish dearly between the value of 'the permanent and indestructibte powers of the soil,' on the one hand, and, on the other, the value due to the two different kinds of improvement - that due to communal efforts and that due to the efforts of the individual owner - the argument for its adoption would be very strong."
~The Constitution of Liberty

Look at what you missed by selectively quoting Adam Smith:
"Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is, in reality, instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have property against those who have none at all." (from Wealth Of Nations)

Ummm, whats your point with this quote? Do you even know what he means by 'property'?

First, how do we determine the value of land after the nationalization of it?

At that point exchange value would no longer mean much, so market rental value would be used.

Assuming we implemented LVT immediately, we obviously have current market prices to determine the value.

Right, and current exchange prices can be combined with current rental prices to determine a relationship between exchange value and rental value for each market.

Then I'm assuming (unlike how it works in the market) the rental value will be a fixed percentage of the land value per year, which I'm assuming would be uniform throughout.

No, once the rental values were initialized based on current data, exchange value would be pretty much ignored.

But how do you "reassess" values after something like severe currency inflation?

Look at market rents.

How do you determine the value of a plot that a speculator doesn't want anymore because the rental value siphons off all the value of the property?

That would ideally apply to all land: the welfare subsidy giveaway to landowners would be eliminated, and thus also the land's exchange value, which is simply the discounted current value of the future subsidy.

Are people still going to buy land even though its essentially in a state of perpetual mortgage?

Do people rent land?

The Empire State Building is built on rented land, and all of Hong Kong is built on rented land, so that answers that question.

Yeah, you can determine "relative" values like saying plot A is 3 times as valuable as plot B but how do you determine the baseline?

From the statistical relationship between exchange value and rental value in each market.

If after nationalization the buying and selling essentially stop,

As allocative efficiency would be improved, there would probably be even more buying and selling, just at greatly reduced exchange prices.

what mechanism to you use to tie the rental values to something that has a market value?

Rental value IS a market value.

Second, would there be enough value collected as rent to fund our 3.5 trillion dollar federal budget? If so how can we know this? Anyone have any idea what the 'rental' value of all land in the US is?

There is much disagreement on this question, even among Georgists. Some say the abolition of other taxes would make land use so economically advantageous that it would raise rents enough to pay for all of government (Smith argued that all taxes come out of land rent anyway). Others believe rents would adjust, but the aggregate total would be about the same. And a few think that releasing all the land speculators are hoarding would flood the market, greatly reducing rents. Personally, I don't think it matters much because whichever way it turns out, it will benefit everyone but the top few percent of landowners. Most people will be FAR better off. If more revenue is needed, there are unjust privileges other than land titles that can be taxed.

Texas Property Tax Code does state it is an ad valorem Land value tax. Improvements are included in the appraisal method.

A land value tax ignores improvements, so no matter what the law CLAIMS the tax is, it is not a land value tax

Land value itself alone not including improvement varies from market value to location.

Care to try saying that in English?

When I say you are penalized from beautification, it isn't because you make the land look pretty. I mean you discourage increasing value of your property improvements. Adding a pool, second story, additions (YES THEY ARE TAXED), and etc.

The ones that actually exist in the real world were established by one group of people conquering and subjugating another group of people.

Many were, but not all. Do you know what a "vote" is?

But I don't see how that set of events gives any legitimacy to the claim of those in the former group to have the right to tax those in the latter group.

First you need to find a willingness to know the fact that governments are not all identical.

Maybe in some imaginary world it is.

That would be the world of the Declaration of Independence.

But in the real world the government's job is to maintain and increase the power the rulers have over those they rule.

OK, so you refuse to know the difference between the governments of Switzerland and Swaziland. Fine. Thanks for playing.

So then all I have to do to attain the right to own land and rent it out to people is call myself a government?

You can never obtain a right to own land, as that inherently violates others' rights to liberty. Government merely administers the possession and use of land, like a trustee. Trustees do not own the trust assets. If the people empower and trust you to secure and reconcile their rights, then you can do that.

It has become obvious to me that you are being deliberately obtuse in order to avoid knowing the facts of objective physical reality that prove your beliefs are false and evil.

But how do you "reassess" values after something like severe currency inflation?

Look at market rents.

Are you saying that there would still be a market for rents, in the sense that people would still be buying selling land even though all the geo-rent is being taken from it?

I'm really trying to wrap my head around the mechanics of how the government would operate such a system. That wealth and want site is a good resource (I think redbluepill posted the link). I'll also check out that Hong Kong system.

I applaud both you and redbluepill for your contribution to this thread. I studied it a while back and had numerous arguments with people about is as you guys are doing. And sidenote: if you think people here are against this idea, try going on the Mises forum, when I tried debating it there never seen so much stubbornness to even considering the idea. So +rep to you and redbluepill! (You guys have obviously invested a lot of typing in this thread)

But I never could take it to the level of explaining the specifics of how the appraising and all that would work. I still can't wrap my head around it totally but that wealth and want website has a lot of stuff I haven't read so far. Subscribing to this thread and will come up with more questions as I can think of them. Thanks for the input.

Are you saying that there would still be a market for rents, in the sense that people would still be buying selling land even though all the geo-rent is being taken from it?

I'm really trying to wrap my head around the mechanics of how the government would operate such a system. That wealth and want site is a good resource (I think redbluepill posted the link). I'll also check out that Hong Kong system.

I applaud both you and redbluepill for your contribution to this thread. I studied it a while back and had numerous arguments with people about is as you guys are doing. And sidenote: if you think people here are against this idea, try going on the Mises forum, when I tried debating it there never seen so much stubbornness to even considering the idea. So +rep to you redbluepill! (You guys have obviously invested a lot of typing in this thread)

But I never could take it to the level of explaining the specifics of how the appraising and all that would work. I still can't wrap my head around it totally but that wealth and want website has a lot of stuff I haven't read so far. Subscribing to this thread and will come up with more questions as I can think of them. Thanks for the input.

It wasn't long ago I was in the same boat as you wizard. In college I realized I was a libertarian. By default I read a lot quite a bit on Mises, Hayek, and Rothbard. But when I started reading Henry George it was like all the pieces fell into place. Not saying he was infallible, but he was pretty much on target.

And yeah, going into the Mises forums and posting something on George is like jumping into a lion's den. The vitriol you will experience over there is astounding.

Of course not. As I said, you are being deliberately obtuse in order to avoid knowing the self-evident and indisputable facts of objective physical reality that prove your beliefs are false and evil.

Since you have claimed that it is necessary to have property taxes in order for people not to own land,

<sigh> At this point, you have exactly two choices: you can provide a direct, verbatim, in-context quote where I made that claim, or you can admit that you are just flat-out lying about what I plainly wrote. Failure to do the first will constitute doing the second. And you will not be doing the first.

All apologists for landowner privilege lie. That is a natural law of the universe. There has never been an exception to that law, and there never will be.

then either they did have property taxes, or they did believe in land ownership, or else your premise about property taxes is wrong.

The premise in question is an outright fabrication on your part, as you are well aware.

2) Did these Indian tribes ever use any means to exclude people from any parcel of land?

Of course. They often contended with rival tribes over the boundaries of communal territories.

Such means would include the existence of any structures, either permanent or movable, which they understood to be any person's or family's exclusive property. Since, if they did have such things, they did, de facto, have land ownership.

No, that's just another dishonest fabrication on your part. Respect for temporary enclosure of space by a dwelling in no way implies ownership of the land under it. There was no notion that the land would still be exclusive to the current user after the dwelling structure was moved or abandoned.

You are employing every dishonest rationalization you can contrive in order to avoid knowing the self-evident and indisputable facts of objective physical reality that prove your beliefs are false and evil. Every apologist for landowner privilege does the same thing, without exception.

I agree. To me the distinction between recognizing certain problems with land ownership, on the one hand, and denying any right of anyone ever to exclude anyone else from any piece of land, on the other hand, is pretty important.

No one has said that. You can obtain a valid right to exclude others from the opportunities nature provided by justly compensating them for the deprivation you impose on them. When there are a large number of them, the only practical way to do that is by paying the market rent to their representative agent, the government.

I have provided several others throughout this thread while you have made false assumptions about several of these economists and philosophers.

You selectively quoted them. I made no such false assumptions. I only go by the words of the philosophers/economists/praxaeologists themselves.

Originally Posted by Torchbearer

what works can never be discussed online. there is only one language the government understands, and until the people start speaking it by the magazine full... things will remain the same.

My music/art page is here"government is the enemy of liberty"-RPEphesians 6:12 (KJV)For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

You're logic is so astoundingly retarted I want to beat my face in with a brick to end the intellectual pain that your are inflicting upon me.

By your logic, I am not privy to the water I purchase, because it "deprives you of nature".

GTFO before you dislodge my brain aneurism.

Originally Posted by Roy L

No one has said that. You can obtain a valid right to exclude others from the opportunities nature provided by justly compensating them for the deprivation you impose on them. When there are a large number of them, the only practical way to do that is by paying the market rent to their representative agent, the government.

Yes, it is. You have described the Texas property tax as if it were a land value tax. It is not.

In Texas we value land AND improvements and combine the two for a total property value. For every 100 dollars of property value, you pay more of your districts' tax rate.

Which describes a property tax, not a land value tax.

Land itself is indeed easier to tax through mass appraisal. However you are boned if you begin to build on it. Then you will be penalized with roll back tax for 5 years for the area you approved on.

Which describes a property tax system, not a land value tax system.

Every three years we are required to reappraise all property values in the county we work in. If you have any new additions then we need to measure the square footage and add that to the property value.

Which describes a property tax system, not a land value tax system.

Are you on something? Or is this just an issue of me being an appraiser for a different state than you?

It's an issue of you refusing to know the fact that improvements are not land.

On the other hand, if your plot just has room for a house and a garden and some power generating and a family size coop of hens, you get off property tax free.

To restore the individual right to liberty, a land value tax would have a universal individual exemption analogous to the universal individual income tax exemption. The difference is that not everyone has income, but everyone does use land. The exemption would apply to tenants as well as landholders, and would enable significant reductions of spending on poverty relief, abolition of minimum wage laws, etc. People don't have a right to money from the government. But they do have a right to access opportunities without having to pay a private landowner to stay out of the way.

You're logic is so astoundingly retarted I want to beat my face in with a brick to end the intellectual pain that your are inflicting upon me.

Then you can imagine how I feel...

By your logic, I am not privy to the water I purchase, because it "deprives you of nature".

What water do you purchase? If you are talking about a fee for using a natural water source, then you are ALREADY paying for it. You are just probably paying the wrong party. If you are talking about buying bottled water in a store, that is not nature, it is a product of labor.

Trying to exclude products of labor from taxation will inevitably lead to a sense of injustice in almost every citizen because it flies in the face of our innate sense of "natural law".

Really? Or is that just religion, habit and tradition talking?

As satisfying and convenient as it may be to propose anarchy or a government funded exclusively through a tax on land, neither is sustainable because we all KNOW* that is "unfair".

I do not know that. It depends on what the government is doing.

No matter how much or little land Bill Gates "owns", how "productive" he was in acquiring his wealth, or what he earns in annual "income"; 99.9% of the population will believe that he should be required to pay much more in taxes than the average citizen.

Gates has profited from a different kind of unjust privilege, so they are right.

* Excepting of course the possibility of the occasional mutant or one whose education has allowed near perfect uncoupling of their consciousness from what the rest of us humans would call "feelings".